Monday, June 9, 2008

Think Tanks, BRT, Money

Why Paul Weyrich doesn't side with the Think Tanks on BRT. Also, has anyone else noticed the Orange Line BRT ridership in LA has stayed flat while the other lines have gone up? I've heard it's at capacity. Two car trains and you're at 35,000 riders easy and 15 minutes off travel time. Thanks Zev.

And on a side note: Greenpeace found out how much money conservative think tanks took for Global Warming Denial, I tallied the Think Tanks I know of that have paid O'Toole and Cox for a Grand total of $1.87 million from Exxon Mobile alone between 1998-2006.

4 comments:

Justin said...

Being gay, I do not agree with Paul Weyrich on many issues. But on transit, I totally agree with him. He wrote a great paper debunking Randall O'toole, and Carl Cox's anti rail claims.

crzwdjk said...

Paul Weyrich is an example that rail transit is really not a partisan issue. So, for that matter, is the infamous Bus Riders' Union of LA. One can make arguments for and against rail transit from both the right and the left.

As for the Orange Line, having seen it, I would definitely agree that it has reached its capacity. There's only so many buses you can run without completely jamming the cross streets. The line also basically serves as a feeder to the heavy rail Red Line, so even though officially headways are 4 minutes, realistically, because a Red Line train comes every 8 minutes, half the buses are packed, and the other half merely full, so they catch up to the ones in front of them and give an effective headway of 8 minutes anyway. This line is a victim of its own success, really, and should have been built as light rail for both speed and capacity.

Cap'n Transit said...

Don't forget Ronald Utt of the Heritage Foundation

Pantograph Trolleypole said...

Heritage was in my calculations. They've hired O'Toole a few times I believe.